


Veracity

by Kandiszucker (whatwhy)



Category: League of Legends RPF
Genre: Cuckgate 2016, F/M, M/M, Pining, Unrequited Crush, of sorts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-13
Updated: 2016-07-13
Packaged: 2018-07-23 20:29:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7478850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whatwhy/pseuds/Kandiszucker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ali knows he has told his viewers already more than he should have. And yet, there are still a few things that he left unsaid.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Veracity

Ali never really cared about Fabian when he was still on H2K. He never seemed to attract rumors like other players did, and with Fnatic practically dissolving he had much bigger fish to fry. But now Fabian is confirmed to join Fnatic, and talking about big organizations always makes his audience happy, so Ali decides to do some research.

He doesn’t come up with much. Fabian seems to have had a sheltered childhood, with supportive parents and loving sisters, and apparently he’s too shy to get involved with anything worth gossiping about on stream. Ali grunts and takes a last look at one of the photos of Fabian before he closes his browser. He looks like a child, Ali thinks, with his chubby cheeks and his bright grin.

 *

Spring split rolls around and Fabian surprises just about everyone with his raw talent. Even Ali can’t help his admiration for the kid, so he decides to befriend him in the hopes that some of his skills might rub off on him. Or at least that Fabian shares some knowledge of the game with him.

They duo together, once or twice. Ali keeps making compliments and the chat spams comments on how gay he sounds, but he doesn’t bother reading them too closely. He’s all set on making Fabian giggle awkwardly and gaining his trust so he can maybe, hopefully, get some dirty secrets out of him. Part of him wonders if Fabian blushes when Ali praises him. But Fabian isn’t streaming so Ali can’t check.

When the stream ends he is half ashamed that he wants to milk Fabian for drama. But then again, does he really care that much about him to pass up a chance of getting insider info on Fnatic?

 *

Ali does care about Fabian, he realizes three episodes into binge-watching Fnatic’s Youtube documentary. There is no other way to explain the smile that spreads on his face whenever they show Fabian with his childlike joy on camera.

He does his best to ignore the pangs of jealousy whenever he sees Fabian goof around with Seunghoon.

If it’s even jealousy at all.

 *

They meet at some convention Ali has forgotten the name of already, a while after worlds. There he is, right in front of him, a bit shorter than Ali has imagined him to be, with an unsure smile and Martin’s arm around his shoulders. They shake hands and hug, and as soon as Ali lets go, Martin has Fabian under his sway again. He notices how Martin keeps whispering into Fabian’s ear, making him giggle, how he keeps hugging and touching him, and how Fabian’s face lights up whenever Martin says something remotely flattering.

Ali decides that he can’t stand him.

 *

The realization hits him in February. Fabian has made some time in his surely busy schedule to duo with him, and even though Ali knows that it honestly isn’t actually such a rare occurrence, he can’t help but feel like the most important person in Fabian’s world. He wishes it was actually true. He savors how Fabian’s voice makes his stomach flutter, how his silly jokes and his naivety make him want to vow to protect him from everyone who could take advantage of him. From Martin.

“Love you”, Ali says before he ends the call and clasps a hand over his mouth when he realizes.

Fabian laughs quietly. “Love you, too.”

Ali wishes it had been a joke.

That night, he curls up around his pillow, pretending it’s Fabian.

 *

He meets Laura in March. She is beautiful, charming, smart. In fact, Ali reckons, he would probably be madly in love with her if he wasn’t so busy having a crush on some professional gamer. Maybe, he thinks, he’ll forget Fabian and start liking her instead if he just forces himself to be with her for long enough.

They start going out and it goes well enough. Laura does keep his mind off Fabian, at least as long as she’s around, and Ali regrets not actually being in love with her. Just a bit longer, he tells himself over and over again, and then he’ll love her like he should. Except he has no idea how to keep Laura around him. Granted, he’s kind of a big deal in the League scene, but apart from that he doesn’t really have much to offer. He’s not smart - he didn’t even finish school - and his looks aren’t the best either, and deep down he knows that his love for gossip isn’t welcome everywhere. He has to find a different solution.

So he buys Laura tickets for the playoff finals in Rotterdam and pays for her flight and her hotel room on top of that.

And because he’s in a generous mood, he does the same for his friend plus girlfriend to be.

 *

Ali arrives in Rotterdam with the highest of expectations. He gets to meet Fabian again and keep their friendship alive - after all, his crush will subside eventually - and chances are Laura will finally, finally let him get some. He even gets asked to do an interview, to which he gladly agrees. It’s flattering. He texts Fabian excitedly, with short replies as usual.

And then, suddenly, Laura is gone.

And so is Liz, Ryan’s girl.

Ali pays it no mind and tells Ryan to calm down. “They’re probably just out doing girl stuff.” Whatever that entails.

 

With nothing else to do, he and Ryan decide to go back to the studio. Everyone else is there too. It has everything to do with them trying to kill some time in nice company, and nothing with trying to ignore the nagging feeling that something is very, very wrong.

The first one to greet them is Mitch. He sits in a lounge of sorts, short and stocky, with a smug grin on his face and an air of snootiness around him. Ali immediately wracks his brain for dirt on Mitch. There has to be a way to get this grin off his face. Tom had a falling-out with Mitch, he vaguely remembers, but he has never told him the reason for it. Ali wonders why. But now the opportunity to dig deeper presents itself on a silver platter, and Ali would be an idiot if he didn’t seize it.

Mitch’s smile does falter when Ali asks him about his argument with Tom. “You know that’s why no one really likes you, right?”

Ali feels like the ground under his feet disappears.

“You had an interview today”, Mitch continues. “You think you’re hot shit, don’t you? But you aren’t. Everyone thinks you’re just a drama whore. Nothing more.”

Ali doesn’t reply. He only grits his teeth.

“You gushed about Febiven, but trust me, even he -”

Ali dives for Mitch, but before he can wrap his hands around his throats, he feels Ryan tug at his sleeve. He glares at Mitch once more, who looks reasonably shaken, and decides that he is satisfied with that. Ryan drags him out of the lounge.

 

“Let’s look for Fabian”, Ryan suggests. “I bet Krepo just said that to get a rise out of you.”

Ali nods, but he isn’t sure he believes Ryan. After all, it has always been Ali to start the conversations, and when Fabian responded, it was more often than not just one sentence, and a short one at that. As a matter of fact, Fabian isn’t even answering his texts now. Interestingly enough, neither are Laura and Liz. All sorts of misgivings are tumbling down onto him.

He hurries through the backstage area of the studio, Ryan following him, out of breath. He only stops when he finds Dayoon and Yeongjin, but they have no idea where Fabian is either. The only thing they can tell Ali for sure is that he went with Martin. Ali watches his life flashing before his eyes.

 

Defeated, he crawls back into the lounge and sure enough, Mitch is still there. He is surrounded by a cluster of well-known faces in the scene, and they laugh at something on Mitch’s phone. He tiptoes closer. Who knows, it might be material for his stream.

“Look at that”, Mitch says in between laughter. “Gross Gore tried to rape her and now he’s wondering why she’s fucking Febiven and Rekkles instead.”

The others burst into laughter.

Ali runs for it.

“Did you actually -”, Ryan asks when they’re outside.

“That is bullshit!”, Ali snaps. “I did not rape her. I did not.”

Ryan looks at him intently.

“I wanted to fuck her but then she asked me to stop and I did”, Ali insists, and it’s the truth.

Ryan nods.

“So, Febiven”, he says.

Ali nods.

“Liz is probably there, too.”

Ali nods again.

Ryan sighs. “Let’s go back to the hotel. It has been a long day.”

Ali has never heard anyone sound as crushed as Ryan.

 *

Laura and Liz are back when Ali wakes up. They look reasonably guilty.

“So, how was your night? Did you two have fun?”, he asks.

They nod.

“Did you meet any players?”

They nod again. “We met Febiven and Rekkles”, Liz says.

“Did you do anything fun together?”

Liz shrugs.

“We just kinda talked.”

“Just kinda talked?”, Ali repeats. He guesses that he makes it seem as if he’s turning the conversation into a cross examination.

Laura hesitates. Then she says: “I kinda kissed Febiven.”

Ali knew that. God, he knew that so it shouldn’t sting as much as it does. The worst part is that he doesn’t even know who he’s jealous of.

“We kissed a lot. But it was really just kissing”, Laura adds.

Ali groans.

 *

To his own surprise, he still attends the games on the second day with Ryan, Liz and Laura. Granted, the fact that it is not Fnatic playing today makes it easier. Still, there is no way to pretend that all is dandy. He knows he has little right to be mad at Laura. It was him who used her first. If anything, he should direct his anger at the cruel fates that made her hook up with the boy he tried to distract himself from, futile as it would be.

Ryan is even worse off. Liz eventually spilled the beans to Ali, who in turn picked the beans up again and practically threw them at Ryan. He still feels a bit guilty for it. But unlike Ali, Ryan actually likes Liz so he figured he should let Ryan know that she doesn’t return his feelings.

They sit in icy silence, even after the first game ends, so Ali actually focuses on the analyst desk. Even though Fabian is their guest today.

Even though there’s a hickey on his neck for everyone to see when the camera focuses on him.

When the games are over and Fabian leaves the desk with a slight yet treacherous limp, Ali can’t help but wonder if Liz left out a few details.

 *

Ali knows his anger is pointless. He knows he has no right to claim Fabian as his own. He can’t make Fabian stop liking Martin and he can’t make him return his feelings. But heavens does he hate this feeling of helplessness. So he does the only thing he knows he’s good at: He drags both of them through the mud.

And he drags Mitch along for good measure.

 *

Ali gets permanently banned from Twitch. As he stares at the message longer and longer, panic sets in. He ruined his own career in an attempt to ruin someone else’s. Sure, he knew that it was a mistake to falsely accuse Mitch of dating minors as soon as he said it, but it was on stream, so there was no way he could take it back. Besides, he could have sworn he wasn’t that big a deal for Riot to actually take him actually seriously enough to get a bunch of lawyers and Twitch employees on his ass.

Turns out he was. But now he can’t be anymore, and try as he might to pin it onto someone else, he has to admit that he fucked up tremendously.

Now he sits in his room, without a decent education, without his career, and to make things worse, without a way to reconcile with Fabian.

He makes a dramatic Facebook post for his audience and an even more dramatic vlog in which he apologizes to Mitch. That’s all he can bring himself to do before he buries his face in his hands and feels sorrier for himself than ever before.

 *

There’s a contract from a streaming platform in his mailbox. Ali has never heard of it before, and upon research it turns out to be much smaller than Twitch, but he clings to this new shred of hope and signs the paper.

He doesn’t watch Fnatic’s YouTube series anymore. Though he doesn’t care to check, he’s pretty sure Fabian blocked him on Twitter. Sometimes he still finds himself wishing he could make up with Fabian and, subsequently, make out, but it happens less and less often.

Life goes on. Ali has to, as well.

**Author's Note:**

> I told y'all I wasn't writing anything and you totally believed me. Got you good, huh? :^)
> 
> I made up the names of the girls because Gross Gore understandably wouldn't mention them in his stream. If I accidentally got them right I'd be surprised.
> 
> Beta'd by dear sweet enmasque, who may or may not be the worst kismesis ever because he's just so sweet.


End file.
